William Shakespeare Quotes

This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.

Though those that are betray'd Do feel the treason sharply, yet the traitor stands in worse case of woe

If you be King, why should not I succeed?

Her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love

I have supped full with horrors.

God bless thee; and put meekness in thy breast, Love, charity, obedience, and true duty!

Mercutio: "If love be rough with you, be rough with love.

Why, this hath not a finger's dignity.

If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark

And oftentimes excusing of a fault Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse, As patches set upon a little breach, Discredit more in hiding of the fault Than did the fault before it was so patch'd.

Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman.

The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders At our quaint spirits.

There is nothing but roguery to be found in villainous men.

If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.

Courage and comfort, all shall yet go well

Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all.

Who could refrain that had a heart to love and in that heart courage to make love known?

It is to be all made of fantasy, All made of passion and all made of wishes, All adoration, duty, and observance, All humbleness, all patience and impatience, All purity, all trial, all observance

Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied, And vice sometime by action dignified.

Nymph, in thy orisons be all my sins remembered!

If thou couldst, doctor, cast The water of my land, find her disease, And purge it to a sound and pristine health, I would applaud thee to the very echo, That should applaud you again.

I am a foe to tyrants, and my country's friend.

Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge.

For trust not him that hath once broken faith

There was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass.

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm in erecting a grammar school.

For here, I hope, begins our lasting joy.

The eagle suffers little birds to sing.

Good name in man and woman is the immediate jewel of their souls.

Well, every one can master a grief but he that has it.

The commonwealth of Athens is become a forest of beasts.

My liege, and madam, to expostulate What majesty should be, what duty is, Why day is day, night night, and time is time, Were nothing but to waste night, day and time. Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief.

This fellow pecks up wit, as pigeons peas; And utters it again when God doth please: He is wit's pedler; and retails his wares.

A jest's prosperity lies in the ear

I do know of these That therefore only are reputed wise For saying nothing.

I would challenge you to a battle of wits, but I see you are unarmed!

For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground And tell sad stories of the death of kings.

And oftentimes excusing of a fault doth make the fault the worse by the excuse.

The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy; his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.

Well, in that hit you miss. She'll not be hit With Cupid's arrow. She hath Dian's wit, And, in strong proff of chastity well armed, From Love's weak childish bow she lives uncharmed. She will not stay the siege of loving terms, Nor bide th' encounter of assailing eyes, Nor ope her lap to saint-seducing gold. O, she is rich in beauty; only poor That, when she dies, with dies her store. Act 1,Scene 1, lines 180-197

Unless hours were cups of sack, and minutes capons, and clocks the tongues of bawds, and dials the signs of leaping-houses, and the blessed sun himself a fair hot wench in flame-colored taffeta, I see no reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand the time of the day.

Death lies on her like an untimely frost.

Past all shame, so past all truth.

How easy it is for the proper-false in woman's waxen hearts to set their forms!

Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good, but graciously to know I am no better.

The trust I have is in mine innocence, and therefore am I bold and resolute.

Tis time to fear when tyrants seem to kiss.